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market-farming - Re: nitrogen burning?

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  • From: "Bill Shoemaker" <wshoemak AT inil.com>
  • To: "Market Farming" <market-farming AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: nitrogen burning?
  • Date: Wed, 9 May 2001 10:55:51 -0500


Nitrogen burning isn't the result of organic nitrogen normally. It's the
result of the salty forms of nitrogen, like ammonium nitrate or urea,
granular fertilizer being used on the plant. A fish emulsion should have
nitrogen as an organic complex which shouldn't cause burning, especially if
diluted and dissolved in water.

Watch for gradual growth of the spots or spread of them. If it's a physical
injury, like nitrogen burning, that occured during watering, the injury
should only occur once and shouldn't spread. Likewise, the spots shouldn't
grow. However, if it's a disease caused by a pathogen you should see some
spread of the disease and growth of the spots on the leaf tissue.

A local Cooperative Extension Service office may be able to help you
identify the problem. Take a few plants showing injury into the office. They
may need to involve a University Specialist, which could take some time, but
you might be able to get a professional diagnosis. Also, some of the state
extension systems are using distance diagnostic systems to relay images to
specialists. They can use a stereoscope with a digital camera hooked up to
computer to send a color image of good quality to specialists who can then
attempt to identify the problem. This results in a relatively quick response
(24-48 hours) in most cases. I know most county offices in Illinois are set
up with these systems now.

Bill Shoemaker
Sr Research Specialist, Food Crops
Univ of Illinois - St Charles Hort Research Center

>Anyone know what nitrogen burning on leaves looks like? I have small
>brown pitted spots on greenhouse plants from many different families.
>They appeared shortly after I watered with a very diluted mixture of
>Neptune's Harvest fish emulsion (the same concentration I used last year
>without problem). The other sympton is shiny sticky-like blotches on
>some plants. Weird. I'm wondering if I didn't shake the container well
>enough, or if a winter's storage in my garage somehow damaged the fish
>emulsion. Thanks, Sue Andersen






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